


Please, breathe

by Jude_ABG



Series: Trinity tales [2]
Category: Batman - All Media Types, Superman - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Angst and Feels, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Anxiety Attacks, Death, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mild Gore, Psychological Trauma, Temporary Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-08
Updated: 2020-04-08
Packaged: 2021-03-02 00:48:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,324
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23546392
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jude_ABG/pseuds/Jude_ABG
Summary: "You were bleedingyou weren't movingand there was nothingI could do about it…"
Relationships: Clark Kent & Bruce Wayne, Clark Kent/Bruce Wayne
Series: Trinity tales [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1791634
Comments: 5
Kudos: 69





	Please, breathe

**Author's Note:**

> Haven't posted in a while, so I wrote this quick one!  
> Again, english in not my first language. Be patient HAHA  
> Stay at home!

Blankness. Not silence, not darkness, but blankness, like a dreamless sleep. Then... this ringing sound on my ears. Dirt under my fingers and the air a little too hot for comfort. I open my eyes slowly. Through the left one I see the floor I'm lying on. There's a huge puddle of blood - _my_ blood. I can't see through the right one

Suddenly my memories return all at once. A battle, the League… Luthor? Kryptonite. A missile, getting closer and closer. Fear, so much of it. A victorious, cruel smile. Screaming. I feel something come up my throat… anxiety, shock - the wish to live. I don't want to die.

Something explodes around me, shaking the ground. I hear shouts, running feet and Diana's sword. The battle… is still happening. Luthor is here.

I push the floor, trying to get up. _Everything fucking hurts_ , but I don't care. My hands are burning and I can barely feel my legs, but at least I'm steady when I'm up. I feel the wetness of my blood all over me, but I don't think about it.

Something soars over my head. There are thousands of robots flying together in groups, movement synchronized in this terrifying dance. They're everywhere, but I see my teammates destroying hundreds of them at a time. There's this scary desperation to their movements, the way they show their teeths and destroy the robots as if they could see the machines bleed.

Then I see Luthor and everything goes silent. He's standing very far away, but he's staring directly at me with wide, frightened eyes. Looking at his face, I feel rage. A rage so pure I start to shake. I want to hear the sound of his neck snapping under my hands. I want to see a puddle of his blood on the floor, just like mine.

I don't realize I'm already moving towards him until Lex takes a shaky step back. I'm not close enough to reach yet, but - he _knows_ I was supposed to be dead, but somehow I'm alive and about to make him pay for his actions. He sees it in my face, my tight jaw, my fists. Somehow I'm stronger than ever.

In the blink of an eye, Luthor's face is in my hand. He doesn't even have time to react. He grabs my arm, trying to pull away, but I just press his jaw and his cheeks harder. I know it hurts. Slowly I raise my right arm and place it behind his head. I notice how my hands are covered in blood and dirt, but I don't care. That's when Lex understands what's about to happen - if he could, he would scream, but my grasp is relentless and only allows him to make desperate noises. He tries to punch me, kick me, swaying his limbs pathetically, but that's useless. I press just a little stronger and there are no sounds anymore, just a wide pleading gaze.

My eyes light up with shining red light. The whole right side of my face burns and aches with it. There's two options: either I make a hole on his skull, see his brains fall out, or I snap his neck and let him die in pain.

"No..."

I stop. _No_. The word had been whispered, but I heard it loud and clear in my ears. Lex notices my pause and only struggles harder - he doesn't seem to learn. Instead, I pay attention to the heavy breathing a few feet away from me.

Batman is not moving. Usually he would be fighting, grabbing me, shouting for me to stop. But he's there, frozen, staring at me with the same wide eyes as Luthor's. Even through the cowl I can see the shock in his expression. Bruce doesn't react when I turn towards him, my grip on Lex still strong. I want to say his name out loud, calm him down, but somehow I know it wouldn't work.

I look at Luthor again. He's already red from the air deprivation, movements slow and weak. It would be so easy to turn his head a little too abruptly and see an end to it. My heart is frantic, enjoying the idea. But for some reason I feel my fingers loosening up. One digit at a time, I allow a little air to enter Lex's lungs. He inhales quickly with a loud gasp. It must be a relief and a curse at the same time, because the man gets weak in a second. So close to fainting, so fucking fragile.

When I let go completely, the man falls to the ground unconscious. The shape of my hands are printed on his skin with my blood. I hadn't realized how trembling my arms were. I turn to Bruce, who's still frozen in place. His jaw is tight now, shaking as if to conceal some emotion.

"Bruce…" I say "... Breathe"  
He doesn't. I hear how fast his heartbeat is, how sick he's getting. I take a step closer, to which he doesn't react.  
"Breathe, Bruce. Breathe…"

***

There was nothing I could do. _Nothing_.  
I always thought I would always be by his side, ready to save him from anything, just like he would for me. But when the time came, I couldn't.

The missile was getting closer and closer to Clark. If the League had noticed it sooner, maybe Lantern or Flash would've been able to help Superman, but they didn't and it was too late. They had missed the kryptonite, they had missed the button, they had missed Luthor.

I was running, but I can't remember why. And for a second I looked at Clark, who turned to me with sad, disturbed eyes. He opened his mouth, ready to say something, but the missile exploded by his feet.

Just then, my world collapsed.  
Everything moved so, so slow in silence. I saw big shards of kryptonite entering Clark, one by one, cutting chunks of him, entering his eye, his throat, his hands. The intensity of the fire threw him back, burning the skin off his body, making it black and red in seconds. And the blood, lots of it, only started to appear when a puddle formed under his mangled body. And then it was finished. I hadn't realized I was screaming until I stopped. I stood still for minutes, hoping the scene would change, but it didn't. Clark was dead, just like that.  
And I felt like I had died with him.

I don't know what happened next. I couldn't feel my body anymore, but I think I was moving. Someone was speaking to me on the comms, but their words had no meaning, made no sense to me. I felt sick. I wanted to lay down and sink as if the ground was made of quicksand. I just knew that I had lost the love of my life. Clark was there, and then he was gone and I did absolutely nothing to stop, to help. He died alone, looking at me with hopeless eyes. It was all gone, like a fucking dream.

My knees hit the ground. My whole body was weak all of a sudden and I didn't care about my safety anymore. I thought I would puke, I would shout. But I just froze looking at my own hands grabbing loose rocks, hearing the battle around me.  
I really don't know how long I was there. It was long enough for my body to get cold and start feeling the effects of the fight. Slowly, I raised my head. It's heavy, I felt numb and tired. What I see, however, makes my heart jump and my skin crawl. My hand flies to my mouth and I get up too quickly for comfort.

That wasn't Superman. That was something else.  
Clark barely had a face anymore. The flesh, dark and burned didn't hide the huge hole in his eye socket. Blood spilled from his mouth, ruining even more his ripped uniform. There were so many cuts, so much blood, a normal person wouldn't have survived. The S on his chest looked like a cruel, vengeful scorn. The one eye he had left was red and murderous. Between his bloodied fingers, Luthor's throat.  
Kal-El looked like a punishment from God.

"No" I whispered, frightened to my soul. What the fuck was happening?

I saw him turn to me. He heard me. His eye wasn't red anymore, but that didn't make the scene less terrifying. He opened his mouth again, as if to say something - I feel my pressure drop. I can't do this again. I can't do this again. I shake my head, holding back the tears. This is wrong. I can't do this.

When I came to me again, Clark was in front of me. I could see Luthor on the ground… was he dead? What happened? The kryptonian stretched his burnt hand, ready to touch my face.

"Breathe, Bruce… Breathe" he said, blood spilling down his mouth. I felt like fainting.

"Bruce… Breathe, my love" The soft voice repeats. A warm hand holds my neck, keeping me upright. I inhale heavily, trying to bring myself to normalcy. I can't breathe, it hurts too much "Shhh, easy, love. Breathe…"

A cold cloth is pressed against my forehead and neck, while the hand lifts my chin carefully. It feels good. I open my eyes slowly and meet Clark's. His alien blues are big and beautiful. There's this little scar under his right one, just this thin line on his dark skin. That's the first scar I ever saw on the kryptonian.

I notice the worry in his expression. I know how anxious he has been because of me the last 2 days. It's not fine yet. It hasn't been long enough. I can't forget what I felt when I saw him.

Finally I start to feel my breathing getting back to my control. My heartbeat is still uncomfortably fast though. I take a deep breath to show my husband the worse has passed. Kal closes his eyes, sighs and pinches the bridge of his nose. Neither of us has slept since the…

I'm sitting on the edge of the bathtub, wearing only dumb boxer shorts and a warm towel around my shoulders. My hair is still dripping wet and I have dark circles a little too deep. Clark doesn't look better. He's kneeling between my legs, holding on to this sad little cloth. He'd been wearing the same pajama shirt all day and his hair is a mess.

Kal is exhausted. He rubs his face and frowns, shaking his head to himself. I close my eyes again and press my jaw tight. If I stare too much I'll start to see the blood again. I don't want this anymore. I'll see the cuts, the pieces of him that were blown away. He'll be dead again if I stare too much.

"Bruce! Hey, hey..." Clark whispers, grabbing my shoulders.  
I had started to shake again. My nails, that needed to be cut, were making my palms bleed with how tight my fists were. Clark grabs my face and shushes me with a low, calm voice, but I know how anxious he really is. How desperately he wants me to be well.

"You were gone" I whisper.  
"What?"  
"You were gone" I repeat, shaking my head. I look around the foggy bathroom, trying to find something to concentrate on that's not his eyes "You didn't get up. You laid there bleeding and all I could do was watch"

Clark carefully pulls me to his lap, cupping my cheek with a hand. His other one massages circles on my side in a soothing way.  
"I'm here, B. I got up!" he says. Kal looks anguished. He's here now, but I can't get over…  
"You were bleeding, your face had melted off and you weren't moving. I was alone…" There are tears in my eyes. I know I'm bringing up bad memories for him too, but I can't find a way to stop. 

"Look at me, Bruce" Kal holds my face with both his hands. We're so close "I'm fine now! I'm fine. I regenerated, remember? I stood under the sun and I regenerated. He _didn't kill me_!"

Suddenly this breaks me. I start crying like I haven't cried in a very long time. The words don't come out, I just sob miserably. Kal doesn't move though - he stares at me with shocked eyes, frozen hands. His breathing is fast and I know his heartbeat must be frantic, but he doesn't move.

"But he _did_. He killed you, Clark" I weep, grabbing the collar of his shirt. I need him to understand "You died!"

Finally, I get to him. For a second he stares at me, stunned and silent. I know he's trying not to hear my words, but soon tears roll down his face reaching his tight jaw. Shaking, he finally understood. "Please, Bruce. Don't..."  
"You died..." My voice fails at the end, but he hears me.

Kal's facade crumbles, showing all the hurt, all the pain he had been holding inside. Now he's crying too, shaking and hiccuping. I hold him, let him grasp onto me with desperation, put his face on my neck to muffle his laments. I latch my arms around him too. We just grabbed each other, but I'm already mourning for the moment we have to let go - because I don't want to. I want to spend my whole life like this, holding Clark, protecting him just like he protects me.

"I don't want to lose you again. I wouldn't survive it, Clark" I whisper, sobbing. Warm fingers pass through my hair, massaging my scalp. I hear him trying to control his breathing, but it’s almost impossible.  
"I'm here, B. No one took me from you" He says, pressing his lips to my neck "Nothing is gonna happen to us now…"

*


End file.
